by Sheila-Ann Bender

Created on: May 27, 2009   Last Updated: May 29, 2009

The sixties were the decade that television programming really began to make a deep impact on the American family. In the fifties, there were still a lot of homes without televisionsbut by the sixties, there were few homes without a black and white set. Families laughed together over the comedic humor of 'The Honeymooners' and 'I Love Lucy'-and cried together over sappy episodes of 'Lassie', which had to have had the saddest theme music of any television show in history. Just hearing the music start to play in the background was enough to make you burst into tears.

In the fifties and sixties, of course, we had very limited television viewing. There was no satellite or cable tv, and we certainly didn't have twenty-four hour programming. At best, we were able to pick up two or three local networksand usually, only one was clear enough to watch. Most stations went off the air right after the evening news at ten o'clock, and absolutely nothing aired after midnight. A still, showing a target and Indian Chief's head, with a highly annoying-and rather frighteningbackground buzz (akin to the sound that tests the emergency broadcast system over our radios) always came on right after the national anthem played, signaling the end of our television programming for the evening.

WESTERNS

Westerns were highly popular in the sixties, and families loved watching the 'shoot-em-ups' together. Afterward, kids would run outside to play Cowboys and Indians. 'Wagon Train', 'Bonanza', 'Laramie', 'The Virginian', 'The Big Valley', 'Have Gun Will Travel', 'The Rifleman', 'Rawhide' and 'Gunsmoke' were all very popular in my west Texas home. 'Gunsmoke' seemed to be the one that we watched and discussed the most. Everyone was just waiting for the day that Marshall Dillon would marry Miss Kitty, but he never did. Westerns aren't very popular here in the twenty-first centuryin fact, I can't think of one currently airing-but they were very popular back then.

MEDICAL DRAMAS

'Ben Casey' and 'Dr. Kildare' were the big medical shows of the sixties. Since then, there have been 'Marcos Welby, MD', 'St. Elsewhere', 'Medical Center', 'House', and the biggest medical drama phenomenon's of this decade: 'Gray's Anatomy' and 'ER'. It seems that medical dramas will continue being big hits in American TV, but Drs. Steamy and McDreamy have nothing over our Drs. Casey and Kildare.

VARIETY SHOWS

Variety shows have all but disappeared from twenty-first television programming,

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